Cuzco Archbishop Palace

Nestares, as he confesses in an interview published by Eduardo Molina Fajardo in The Last Days of García Lorca, was the one who convinced the commander José Valdés to join the Falange. “I had his record and other things hidden on the roof of my house, in an oak tree, when the provincial chief, Antonio Robles, gave me the file (…). It was a time when, out of fear, no one wanted to be the depositary of compromising documents”.

According to Nestares, more than one of those uncontrolled and bloodthirsty groups called the “black squad” acted in Granada, among them the group of El Panaero. “They were really hired killers,” he tells Molina Fajardo. “They were led by Julio Romero Funes [responsible police officer], although at other times they acted on their own. Apart from that, as throughout the Civil War, there were uncontrolled acts that, despite some other chastisement, it was impossible to keep at bay.” Romero also directed his own repression squad, together with Nestares and the policeman Ángel Martín, known as Flying Patrols.

The Cuzco Palace in Víznar, where the rebels set up their headquarters during the coup of 1936, is a building attached to the parish of Víznar where the archbishops of Granada used to spend their summers. The building is well preserved, is privately owned and is open to the public once a year.

At the end of the 18th century, the archbishop of Granada, Juan Manuel Moscoso y Peralta, a powerful man born in Peru, related to the Creole nobility and who served as an ensign of Cuzco before taking the habit, added several adjoining lots, expanded the residence and the garden (thanks to the transfer of two streets by the Municipal Council of Víznar) and had a well built to supply the inhabitants of the house.

Juan Manuel Moscoso’s life was very hectic. After studying philosophy in Peru, he married at the age of 24 with a woman from the upper classes. After her death and that of his first-born son, he suffered a severe depression that led to his ordination to the priesthood and, later, to his appointment as bishop in 1771. Subsequently he traveled to Spain and specifically to Granada where he resided at least from his appointment as archbishop in 1789 until his death in 1811.

The palace has two floors, with large rooms and a double porticoed gallery. In the upper part of the gallery there are magnificent frescoes by various artists, including Nicolás Martín Tenllado, an artist with a history as curious as that of the archbishop himself. Tenllado was a celibate who ran a lucrative bric-a-brac business but that after his social ascent was judged by the Inquisition and had several lawsuits for the blasphemy and insults to religion that he used to exclaim while making his paintings, inside convents and churches.